Planning an outdoor wedding? Expect rain.

My friend Jock Stewart was supposed to write this post, but he’s pre-drinking for the weekend.

However, he scribbled a note on the back of a bar napkin: “Malcolm, 99% of the people in the world can be divided into two groups, cynics and fools.The other 1% know the power of bribery and magic.”

What this means for Northwest Georgia tomorrow is this: If you’re planning an outdoor wedding reception complete with flower bowers and booze that cost you 20 grand, the thing’s going to be rained out. You should have bought “rain insurance” (I think Lloyd’s of London sells that) or paid off Mother Nature or asked the conjure woman down the road to do a weather spell. These spells are similar to Patton’s Weather Prayer except for the fact you’re planning for a marriage rather than a battle.

Of course, those are often the same thing.

Without doing your home work, the wedding will have to be moved into the garage or the attic, and neither place is likely to have the ambiance of your back yard garden.

It goes without saying, that cynics are more likely to expect rain, but to also expect bad luck no matter how many alternate venues are prepared. Fools hope for the best, and while they are the good people that bad things happen to, there’s less stress involved if things work out fine.

Since my wife and I are planning a short road trip tomorrow, we expected rain. So, we’re leaving the surrey with the fringe on top in the garage and taking the Buick. (Don’t make jokes about our Buick.) The Buick has a roof, windows that close, and a heater, along with the other necessary parts. I gassed it up at Mr, C’s Shell Station this morning, so it’s ready to go when the black clouds roll across the county in the morning.

My mother was the eternal optimist. She’d plan an outdoor even event if all the weathermen in the state were forecasting storms, and the thing would come off perfectly with nary a drop of rain. She believed in the law of attraction before anyone knew what it was or she knew more magic than I suspected.

Since I’m more of a Murphy’s Law kind of person, my wife and I will be driving in the rain tomorrow. As for you, I hope you weren’t planning to get married in the garden Saturday afternoon.

2 thoughts on “Planning an outdoor wedding? Expect rain.”

We definitely don’t need the snow, because we’ll be taking a winding and hilly road in “Georgia’s mountains.” It gets really messed up when there’s an ice storm or freezing rain. Of course, people expect snow in your neighborhood.